A key action of the recent government bill was to abolish the two -year qualification period for employees to claim unfair dismissal.
The bill proposes that the right to request an unfair dismissal will be available for employees of their first day of work.
Instead of a qualification period, there will rather be an initial period of employment. During this initial period, the employer will always have to provide a valid reason for dismissal, such as capacity or conduct, a statutory prohibition or other substantial reason (SOSR).
However, the government suggests that a “slight” process will be available during this initial period, except in the event of redundancy dismissals. For redundancy layoffs, this would always follow the same approach, whatever the duration of service, and any payment of statutory redundancy would always be subject to the two -year qualification period.
Specific details relating to this initial period of employment must still be confirmed, such as the way in which the “light touch” process is different, how they will be assessed in court and the duration of this period (however, there are suggestions that this could reach nine months after employment).
Although this change is not supposed to take place before the fall of 2026, this will now affect new employees, because they will obtain unjust dismissal rights from the date of this change, which will probably be lower than the previous two years window.
Consequently, employers are advised to ensure that there are robust probation processes in place and performance measures and assessments during this period.
More information will be provided when we know more.
